The relief and rescue teams concentrated in the large Turkish cities after the earthquake, but there are a large number of small towns that support has not yet reached, the Spanish news agency Efe reports today.
The earthquake that last Monday devastated the southeast of Turkey, in an area larger than the surface of Portugal, caused a high degree of destruction, including basic infrastructure, which made it difficult to distribute aid.
The Turkish daily Hurriyet reports today that many of the roads leading to rural towns in the region are closed due to snowfall, while the poor condition of many mountain roads, which were already closed before the earthquake, complicates communications. .
“Perhaps it is insufficient, but state and voluntary aid has reached the cities, but almost nothing has reached thousands of towns where people are struggling to survive,” emergency medical specialist Yilmaz Kurt told Efe.
Yilmaz Kurt traveled this week to the province of Kahramanmaras – where the epicenter of the earthquakes was located – and set up a field hospital on his own in the town of Alçiçek, from where he described the dramatic situation in many small towns.
“The greatest luxury here is a tent, which people put together with everything they can find and put a stove inside,” the doctor described, adding that the number of deaths in smaller towns could be lower because traditional constructions are more resistant to earthquakes. but the post-disaster situation among the survivors worsens day by day due to the lack of outside support.
In many localities, houses have become uninhabitable and alternatives such as tents are not enough, and the lack of water and food also affects the animals in these small farming villages.
“Most of the sheds collapsed. Although the authorities assure that there are no large losses of animals, the lack of water and food is a big problem, ”he stressed.
The earthquake affected a population of 13 million inhabitants in 10 Turkish provinces, where access to water remains cut off or restricted in the best of cases, there is a lack of food and the cold also increases the risk of epidemics.
Although more than 100,000 rescuers and emergency personnel work in the area, its enormous size, the high degree of destruction, the more than 1,000 registered aftershocks and the cold make it difficult to help those affected by the earthquake.
Source: TSF
